Office chairs, compared on specs the maker actually publishes
Most chair reviews quote numbers you can't trace anywhere. We quote only figures published by the manufacturer, link the page each one came from, and write “Not published” when the maker doesn't give a figure. We don't sit in the chairs and we never pretend to.
Start with the spec comparison: seat height, weight capacity, lumbar adjustment and warranty for every chair we cover, each row sourced.
Start here
- Best office chairs for posture — the full spec table, plus two chairs we removed because their makers discontinued them.
- Best office chair with lumbar support — the four things “lumbar support” can mean, and which one you actually need.
- Office chair vs gaming chair — what genuinely differs, and what's only marketing.
- Best office chair under $300 — which features survive the price cut and which don't.
- Best standing desk for a home office — four desks compared, and why two of the published height ranges measure a frame rather than a desk.
- Ergonomic home office setup — get this right before you spend anything.
How to choose an office chair by spec
Four published figures decide whether an office chair fits you, and they are the four columns in every chair table on this site. (The desks get their own four, because a desk publishes a height range and a frame type rather than a seat height and a lumbar mechanism.) Seat height is the one to check first: if the lowest setting doesn't put your feet flat on the floor, nothing else about the chair matters. Weight capacity is a tested figure the maker has to stand behind, which makes it the most honest proxy for frame and mechanism quality. Lumbar adjustment separates chairs that adapt to your back from chairs that expect your back to adapt — the lumbar support guide explains the four mechanisms. Warranty tells you how long the maker expects the chair to last; the spread runs from two years to twelve across the chairs we cover.
Where the verified chairs are
The best office chair for posture page carries the three premium chairs we have verified and the two we removed because their makers discontinued them. The best office chair under $300 page carries four chairs whose makers listed them at or under $300 on their own sites, with the same four columns. The best standing desk for a home office page carries four desks on their own four columns — height range, weight capacity, frame and motor, warranty — and explains why two of those published height ranges measure a bare frame rather than a finished desk. If you are choosing between categories, the gaming chair vs office chair comparison covers what genuinely differs.
Every chair we've verified, on one screen
Seven chairs, three columns: the three figures that decide fit and longevity before anything else. Each value is the manufacturer's own, read off the source linked on the page named under the chair, and this table is generated from the same data as those pages, so it can't drift from them. Lumbar adjustment is left off here only because it doesn't fit in a cell — it's on both chair pages, and it's the column most worth reading.
| Chair | Seat height | Weight capacity | Warranty |
|---|---|---|---|
| Herman Miller Aeron (Size B) On: best office chair for posture | 14.8–22.8 in | 350 lb (Size B; Size A 300 lb, Size C 400 lb) | 12 years, 3-shift |
| Steelcase Leap On: best office chair for posture | 15.5–20.5 in as standard; 17–24 in with the optional 7 in cylinder | 400 lb (Leap Plus: 500 lb) | 12 years, multi-shift, parts and labor |
| SIDIZ T50 On: best office chair for posture | Not published | 275 lb (ANSI/BIFMA tested) | Up to 12 years |
| SIHOO M18 On: best office chair under $300 | Not published | 330 lb | 3 years |
| Staples Hyken On: best office chair under $300 | 17.2–20.9 in | 275 lb (rated on an 8-hour workday) | 5 years |
| Autonomous ErgoChair Core On: best office chair under $300 | 20–23.8 in | 242.5 lb | 2 years |
| IKEA MARKUS (Medium) On: best office chair under $300 | 18.1–22.5 in | Tested for 276 lb | 10 years, limited |
Seat heights are the maker's published range. Two cells read “Not published” because SIHOO and SIDIZ give no seat height at all — not because we didn't look. The Staples Hyken figures were last confirmed on 3 September 2026; Staples now blocks automated checks, so we haven't been able to re-read them since.
Every standing desk we've verified
| Desk | Height range | Weight capacity | Warranty |
|---|---|---|---|
| FlexiSpot E7 standing desk On: best standing desk for a home office | 22.8–48.4 in (frame only, FlexiSpot's own note: “Without Top”) | 355 lb max. static load | 15 years frame, motor and electronics; 2 years on a chipboard top |
| FlexiSpot E7 Pro standing desk On: best standing desk for a home office | 25.0–50.6 in (frame only) | 440 lb max. static load | 15 years frame, motor and electronics; 2 years on a chipboard top |
| UPLIFT V2 standing desk frame On: best standing desk for a home office | 24.3–49.9 in (frame only) | 355 lb lifting capacity | 15 years, all UPLIFT Desk products |
| IKEA MITTZON sit/stand desk (63x31 1/2 in, electric) On: best standing desk for a home office | 24 3/8–49 5/8 in (complete desk, top included) | 176 lb max. load | 10 years, limited |
Read the height column carefully: FlexiSpot and UPLIFT publish the range of the bare frame, IKEA publishes the finished desk with its top. Add your desktop's thickness to the frame figures before comparing them with anything. The standing desk page explains why that matters more than it looks.
Four things the spec sheets taught us
Reading manufacturers' own documents rather than review summaries turned up four findings that change what you'd buy. None of them needed a hands-on test.
- The Leap's famous seat-height range isn't standard. Steelcase's own specification guide gives the standard Leap 15½ to 20½ inches; the 17-to-24-inch range quoted widely online is an optional cylinder you have to order. Details on the posture page.
- A silent spec page isn't a silent manufacturer. Herman Miller's Aeron spec page omits weight capacity; its product-sheet PDF publishes it for each of the three sizes. Check the PDF before believing “not listed”.
- Desk heights are measured two different ways. Frame-only versus finished desk, as above — a difference of a desktop's thickness, hidden inside numbers that look directly comparable.
- Weight capacity is the spread nobody mentions. Among the desks, IKEA's MITTZON publishes a 176 lb maximum load against 355–440 lb for the frames. Among the chairs, capacities run from 242.5 lb to 400 lb (500 lb for the separate Leap Plus). If you are heavy, or your desk carries two monitors on arms, start with this column.
How to use these tables in five minutes
- Measure yourself, not the chair. Sit on a firm, flat surface with your feet flat and your thighs level, and measure from the floor to the crease behind your knee, in the shoes you work in. That is roughly the seat height you need. Our setup guide walks through the rest of the position.
- Strike out every chair whose published seat range doesn't include that number. If the cell says “Not published”, that chair is unverified for you — not ruled out, but you'll be finding out after it arrives.
- Check capacity against your weight with a margin. It's a tested figure, and the most honest proxy a spec sheet gives for how the mechanism is built.
- Then decide how much lumbar adjustment you need. The lumbar guide sorts chairs into four mechanisms and explains which problem each one solves.
- Use the warranty as the tiebreak. It's the maker's own estimate of how long the chair should last, in writing.
What changed recently
We re-check availability on every product here weekly, because a chair you can't buy is a worse recommendation than a wrong measurement. As of 1 October 2026: the Secretlab Omega and Autonomous MyoChair are discontinued and out of the tables, with their successors named on the posture page; SIDIZ's own US store lists every T50 colour as sold out, with no discontinuation notice, so the T50 stays listed with a warning; and every other chair and desk above is still sold by its maker.
What we don't do
We don't sit in the chairs, and we say so. There are no scores out of ten, no star ratings, and no prices, because all three go stale or get invented. When a maker doesn't publish a figure the cell says “Not published”, and when we find a chair has been discontinued it comes out of the table and into a section that names its successor. More on the about page.